It’s not too uncommon for us to be with friends or co-workers and someone mention something silly or mischievous their kids have done recently and we respond “Our cats do that too!” So, without further adieu, here is proof that our cats do things that make them just like children.

They spread their toys everywhere and never clean up after themselves.

They would rather play with the boxes their toys come in than the toys themselves.

They love playing with bubbles.

They scratch themselves in public.

They hold your things hostage and demand your attention.

They love watching the same shows over and over.

And they always fall asleep in front of the TV and have to be carried off to bed.

They love playing hide-and-seek.

They’d rather eat from our plates than their own.

They love blanket forts.

They like wearing dad’s shoes.

They’re always fighting.

They’re always putting their elbows on the table.

They climb all over you while you’re on the phone with the credit card company.

They sleep in the weirdest positions.

They insist on sleeping between us. And hog all the covers.

And sometimes all reasonable forms of discipline fail and we do things we know we shouldn’t do. But it’s pretty effective at keeping them out of trouble.

Like this:

Today is the last day of LDS General Conference — a time when Mormons all over the world get together and listen to their leaders talk on a range of faith-based topics. Among those topics are commitment and love and how to improve relationships with your spouse. LDS leaders give advice to men: listen to your wives, support them, help them, love them, etc. They give advice to women: listen to your husbands, support them, help them, love them, etc.

Seeing posts by friends on social media about General Conference makes me wonder something I think is important for a church that’s on the record against same-sex marriage and relationship. Do these same principles apply for gay couples? Senator Heigi Heitkamp of North Dakota has an answer:

There’s been a surge of traffic to my blog about LDS temples being shut down or forced to perform same-sex marriages in the temple. It’s something a lot of people fear, not just Mormons, and apparently it’s on a lot of minds again. I wrote a blog post about this a while back and made these points:

Exemptions are usually written into laws for religious organizations that don’t believe in same-sex marriage

A lot of churches have made LGBTQ members feel unwelcome so even if they allowed same-sex marriage, LGBTQ members probably wouldn’t want to be married in your churches or temples anyway

The LDS Church currently discriminates against any straight member(s) when it comes to marriage (e.g., couples who have sex before marriage can’t get married in the temple)

And there’s a lot of bad information out there on the topic. All we have to do to get good information is read the laws and draw our own conclusions about whether or not this can/will happen. Maryland’s ballot measure is a good example to look at. Here’s the wording of the law:

“Establishes that Maryland’s civil marriage laws allow gay and lesbian couples to obtain a civil marriage license, provided they are not otherwise prohibited from marrying; protects clergy from having to perform any particular marriage ceremony in violation of their religious beliefs; affirms that each religious faith has exclusive control over its own theological doctrine regarding who may marry within that faith; and provides that religious organizations and certain related entities are not required to provide goods, services, or benefits to an individual related to the celebration or promotion of marriage in violation of their religious beliefs.”

20 words related to the rights of gay/lesbian couples and about 50 on religious exemption. So, will churches be forced to perform same-sex marriages? Not a chance — there’s nothing to be afraid of.

Something else I’ve learned with all the hubbub around marriage equality: we’re all just looking for information that confirms what we already “know” (i.e., believe), and we rarely engage in discussion in a way that supports learning or discovery of new information. In other words, we’re all just trying to make a point, and we need the most believable stuff out there to win: statistics and an abstract from a research article.

I’ll illustrate by referring to the infamous Regnerus study. If you believe marriage should be between one man and one woman, you might grab onto the study and say something like “research shows that children raised by gay couples aren’t as well-adjusted as children raised by a mom and a day” without having first read the study.

Or you might rely on a summary of the research from a secondhand source like Fox News.

Or a friend.

In short, few of us do our own reading and thinking, and even fewer of us think critically about how people come to the conclusions they come to. We accept it on authority. And I’ll admit — I do it too. Jon Stewart is my go too source for accurate, factual information.

And this becomes problematic when it comes to important topics like marriage equality and human rights. It almost always becomes a game of he said she said. Or rather Jon Stewart said Bill O’Reilly said.

I’m not really sure how the discussion should happen. It seems like asking questions and having a dialogue should be enough, but that always comes across as challenging the source of authority. And this is problematic when the authority is God, a prophet of God, or Jon Stewart. You can’t challenge them. They’re smart, educated people.

Here’s another problem. It’s easy for me when people challenge Jon Stewart. He’s just a dude with a talk show. It’s probably not as easy for other people when God is challenged. He’s THE dude that knows it all. And when research doesn’t confirm (or deny) the message he trying to send through his messengers, it kinda plays with you.

That’s what I love about our country. It was set up so we won’t have to have these conversations. It was set up so you can go to church on Sunday and I can watch Jon Stewart four nights of the week. You can believe I’m going to hell for marrying a dude, and I can believe you’re wrong. I can believe I’m happy, and you can believe only straight families are happy. I’m okay with that.

So I’ll conclude with one point.

And state what I want (and it’s not an attack on your God or your religion) regardless of what research or religion says: equality.

Two court cases related to marriage equality were heard this week (Proposition 8 and DOMA) and left behind good and bad discussion: discussion that brought people together and discussion that further divided. At least that’s how it has been for me. I have family and friends in Utah where the majority of people are against marriage equality. And I have co-workers and friends here in Maryland where the majority of people are in favor of marriage equality (and if they’re not in favor of marriage equality they are at least willing to share in my happiness). This means my news feed on Facebook has been full of all different types of political discussion, which raised questions for me:

How do you respond to people you disagree with? Do you try to see their point of view? Do you try to get them to see your point of view? Do you try to convince them your point of view is good?

I’d like to believe good people can be convinced to do things by people in authority even when the things they do hurt others. So part of me thinks it’s worth a shot to convince them of my point of view. Something like, “Hey, when your leaders tell you to put money into campaigns like Yes on 8, Protect Marriage, or Preserve Marriage, (or to otherwise speak out against marriage equality) you’re sending the message to me that you think it’s fair Dan and I pay more in taxes (somewhere around $3000 per year) and health care than we would if one of us were female.” But that doesn’t really seem to help.

“The Milgram experiment on obedience to authority figures was a series of social psychology experiments conducted by Yale University psychologist Stanley Milgram, which measured the willingness of study participants to obey an authority figure who instructed them to perform acts that conflicted with their personal conscience.” Wikipedia

And then I stop and think, “Hey, maybe I’m being selfish. Maybe I need to stop and think about them and their point of view.” Well, I used to be one of them and so I did think like them. What ultimately changed my opinion on the topic of marriage equality was understanding that I could maintain my system of beliefs while others enjoyed legal benefits. This doesn’t seem to help as much as it should though. I can’t do the thinking for them. They’ve got to do the thinking, learning, and stretching outside of their comfort zone, which typically involves going against authority — and that just ain’t gonna happen.

The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints does not allow their buildings to be used for political events, does not use their pulpit for political messages, and never uses their member lists of politics. EVER. Unless it’s a moral issue…

And then I remember what happened when I tried to engage people in discussions about Proposition 8 back in 2008: lots of feuds, divisions, he said she saids, and “unfriending”. So maybe I shouldn’t speak up.

And then I remember what happens when people don’t speak up: absolutely nothing. I want something to happen. I don’t want to be held to the standards of others when it comes to the legal rights I should enjoy. I don’t want your religious beliefs to dictate what my employer’s insurance company charges me for health insurance nor how much my government taxes me (to name a few things). And I actually think it’s what you (those who disagree with marriage equality) want too: freedom from the religious beliefs and practices of others and government recognition of the marriage your [insert religious person here] performed.

“A right delayed is a right denied” Martin Luther King, Jr.

And that leads into something I find interesting. A lot of religious people have been saying the solution to the marriage equality problem is for government to step out of marriage. That would essentially place them in the same position I’m in: if the government doesn’t recognize a legal union or contract between two people then the union doesn’t exist, and this means no one can recognize your union (because it doesn’t exist). So… if y’all are really for government stepping out of marriage, I just want to make sure you’re okay with paying more in taxes and health insurance, or not having visitation rights at the hospital. This would look something like you going to the hospital to visit your wife and the hospital saying, “Oh, we don’t recognize [insert religion] marriages. You’ll need to provide legal documentation of your union.” And then you’ll walk away or present a legal document you paid a lawyer $3000 to $4000 to write up for you. Is that really what you want? Or let’s say you want to marry that latina girl you met while serving as a missionary and live in the U.S. You can’t do it if the government won’t recognize your religious union.

And just because it’s a cat that looks almost as handsome as Mishaand he’s in a bag and the bag is an HRC bag…

See the resemblance? Here’s Misha with his pride beads on.

So how do we have this conversation about the things that matter most to us in a way that’s productive?

thatmormonboy recently uploaded a video to YouTube and asserted 12 points about the LDS Church in order to build bridges between gays and Mormons (see the Church’s website www.mormonsandgays.org for more detailed info on what the LDS Church teaches). I want to comment on many of the points thatmormonboy made, starting with the last point. And the reason I want to comment is because the points he makes are more nuanced than he presents, and much of the miscommunication relates to the nuanced points he doesn’t address: Church doctrine assumes one position and members of the Church can assume other positions.

The purpose of my commentary on the subject is to add my unique perspective as a former member of the LDS Church, gay man, and behavior analyst. My comments shouldn’t be considered exhaustive, but I want to put info out there. Specifically, I want to provide a few additional references on the topic that are often overlooked, discuss clinical limitations that are often misunderstood, and offer a few questions we should be asking to help guide our current understanding and communication on the topic.

thatmormonboy on gays and Mormons and the use of electroshock aversion therapy

So, let’s take a look at the last point thatmormonboy made about gays and Mormons. Here we go.

#12 “…the Mormon Church used to torture gay people like Nazi experimenters by electrocuting them and trying to reorient them as heterosexuals. (This a completely wild exaggeration of what happened).”

As thatmormonboy said, this is a completely wild exaggeration of what happened. I’m not sure why he started with the wildest of exaggerations, but it makes for a decent transition to the history of ethical conduct in research:

The National Research Act gave rise to institutional review boards (IRB) “to assure, both in advance and by periodic review, that appropriate steps are taken to protect the rights and welfare of humans participating as subjects in a research study”

So, much of the research on aversion therapies was happening around the time ethical treatment of human subjects was a major concern worldwide and a developing area, which leads to the next point thatmormonboy made:

“The medical community believed homosexuality was a mental disorder. BYU allowed the practice [of aversion therapy] for a short time and abandoned the practice decades before the APA did.”

Some clarification is in order. The APA came out with an official statement in 2006 that aversion therapy is not to be used to treat homosexuality. This is not the time the practice of aversion therapy slowed. Using Google Scholar, I searched “aversion therapy electroshock homosexuality” by year from 1974 to 1980. Around 1978, publications shifted from implementation of electroshock aversion therapy to discussing ethical implications of the therapy, and by 1980 there are no publications on the use of the therapy to treat homosexuality and only a few publications about the use of the therapy to treat pedophilia. So, I think it’s safe to assume the use of electroshock aversion therapy to treat homosexuality was generally considered unethical by 1980. Like thatmormonboy mentioned, aversion therapy was practiced on gay individuals because homosexuality was considered a disorder in the DSM. It was reclassified as “sexual orientation disturbance” in 1974 and completely removed from the DSM in 1987.

So, what did BYU do regarding aversion therapy and homosexuality? Max Ford McBride, under the direction of Dr. Eugene Thorne, completed his dissertation at BYU in 1976 and studied the effect of electroshock aversion therapy on male arousal to different stimuli (e.g., nude images of men women). A copy of his dissertation is available here. This is the only “publication” I’m aware of. Additional information about the procedures are discussed here in an interview with Dr. Thorne.

a link to Max Ford McBride’s dissertation at BYU on electric or electroshock aversion therapy back in 1976

The major points I’d like to drive home about this research are:

The research was conducted at a time when ethical considerations were important

McBride cited other, less aversive methods investigated to examine the same variables

“…the subject was deprived of liquids for 18 hours, sodium chloride and an oral diuretic was also given. When the subject exhibited appropriate heterosexual responses he was reinforced with a lime drink. Intake of liquid was contingent on heterosexual fantasies and/or progressively greater increases in penile circumference.”

“…a female slide was superimposed on a sexually attractive male slide with a fraction of the light intensity of the male picture… If a satisfactory erectile response occurred the light intensity of each slide was altered, the female slide becoming increasingly brighter until the female slide alone was projected.”

To summarize, these studies, including McBride’s, were extremely limited, and the limitations can be summarized with the following:

(1) increases in penile circumference were limited to stimuli presented in the studies,

(2) no follow ups were conducted to determine the extent to which penile responses generalized to novel stimuli (e.g., actual female genitalia),

(3) maintenance of the effect over extended periods of time was not demonstrated,

(4) penile circumference is not a measure of sexual preference or sexual orientation,

(5) and no subjects reported a change in sexual orientation.

And one important thing to point out about McBride’s study that is almost always overlooked: the primary question he examined was whether the type of stimuli — slides depicting nude/clothed men or women — resulted in different therapeutic outcomes. And guess what he found out?

“Our data did not support the popular notion that the male homosexual is more positively attracted to nude stimuli as opposed to clothed. The present study’s results indicate that homosexual attraction to members of the same sex is more general and not restricted to male nudity.” (And then he went on to mention that they did get better therapeutic results when nude stimuli were used).

So… All this research and effort later, he made an important discovery: gay men aren’t just attracted to naked men, they’re also attracted to clothed men. It seems like a silly discovery now, but I guess it was revolutionary in 1976.

But let’s get back to the parenthetic statement above: part of the reason he conducted his research was to back up the use of nude stimuli. Think about the context. BYU clinicians showing… porn… to BYU students…? And that’s what the study was really about. Finding data to support the use of nude images in aversion therapy:

“Because the therapist will have a scientific rational for utilizing nude stimuli it will help solve the moral and ethical question regrind the use of potentially ‘offensive’ material. Such considerations should be particularly important at religious and privately endowed institutions where the use of nude VCS has been challenged on the grounds that it is offensive and not therapeutically warranted.”

So, a few questions I’d like to raise:

Given less aversive procedures like fading were cited (and used and found to have similar results as shock) and given the experimental question, why even use shock? (And this question is really only important to those who assert BYU owes an apology for the use of shock). Why was using nude v. clothed images a moral and ethical issue but the use of shock v. fading wasn’t?

Given the experimental question and results obtained, why do we focus the discussion on efforts to change sexual orientation and whether orientation can change?

When it comes to current research (on any topic), are we justified to expose people to pain or discomfort in an effort to justify the actions (e.g., using nude male images) of an institution?

If the study was conducted to justify the use of nude images in aversion therapy, is it possible that aversion therapy was being used outside of this one study? Was Dr. Thorne the only one doing this type of work at BYU?